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Croatia will not join US President Donald Trump’s “Board of Peace,” the Balkan country’s Prime Minister Andrej Plenković said on Wednesday without giving specific reasons for the decision.
“After thorough analyses, the position of the government…is that at this moment Croatia would not join the ‘Board of Peace’ for a number of reasons,” Plenković told reporters.
The prime minister said he would elaborate on the reasons for the decision at a later date.
Earlier this month, the government said the European Union member country had been invited to join Trump’s new international institution.
Plenković said that Croatia was waiting until the EU harmonises its views, while “assessing the legal and other aspects of the proposal.”
On Wednesday, he spoke about the issue with President Zoran Milanović, with the latter arguing that the invitation should be reviewed by the national security council.
Trump launched his “Board of Peace” initiative at the World Economic Forum in Davos last week and was joined on stage by leaders and officials from the 19 countries who had agreed to sign its founding charter.
“We’re going to have peace in the world,” Trump announced, flanked by Argentina’s Javier Milei and Hungary’s Viktor Orbán.
Although originally meant to oversee Gaza’s rebuilding, the board’s charter does not seem to limit its role to the Palestinian territory.
Trump said last week he expects more than 50 countries to join, in what appears to challenge the United Nations Security Council’s traditional role in international conflict resolution.
Key US allies, including France and the UK, have expressed doubts about the organisation.
But eyebrows have been raised about some of the countries invited to join the body, including Russia and Belarus.
On Wednesday, Belarus became the latest country to join the board, despite concerns over Minsk’s years-long crackdown on dissenting voices and continued support for Moscow in its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, putting the eastern European country under severe sanctions from Brussels and others.
In a statement on X, the “Board of Peace” said it “welcomes Belarus as a founding member of our growing international organisation.”
It is unclear whether Minsk paid the $1 billion fee required to secure permanent membership.
The Belarusian Foreign Ministry said in a statement last week that Minsk was “prepared to take an active role in shaping a new architecture of global and regional security based on the principles of mutual respect and the unconditional consideration of the national interests of the member states.”
Additional sources • AFP
